The present invention relates to a rendering apparatus and method which receive print information from an information processing apparatus such as a host computer and output rendering data to a printing apparatus such as a page printer, and to a printing apparatus, a printing control apparatus, and control method for the apparatuses.
Conventionally, in the printing apparatus of a printing system which is constituted by an information processing apparatus such as a host computer and the printing apparatus such as a page printer for receiving print information from the information processing apparatus and printing the information, since one rendering process list is rendered by a single rendering apparatus, a plurality of rendering process lists cannot be rendered in parallel.
To print using a color printing apparatus having four-coIor simultaneous print processes for simultaneously outputting images of four colors, i.e., Y, M, C, and K, a rendering apparatus is prepared for each of the four-color simultaneous print processes. Each rendering apparatus renders a rendering process list of a corresponding color and prints it by a corresponding print process.
Alternatively, a storage means is prepared for storing an image for at least one page, data of each color is rendered in turn by a single rendering apparatus, and the rendered image data is stored in the storage means. When the rendered image data for one page is assembled, printing is started.
However, in the prior art in which a plurality of rendering apparatuses are prepared, even when the rendering speed is higher than the printing speed of the printing apparatus, rendering apparatuses are required in number equal to the number of print processes, resulting in an increase in cost.
In the example in which a storage means for holding image data is prepared, an enormous storage capacity is necessary, resulting in high cost. In addition, unless images of all colors are generated, printing cannot be started. This decreases the printing speed.
The present invention has been made to solve the above problems, and has as its object to provide a rendering apparatus and method which can cause a single rendering apparatus to generate rendering data for a multicolor image.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a printing apparatus for printing on the basis of rendering data generated by the rendering apparatus that solves the above-described problems, a printing control apparatus, and a control method for the apparatuses.
In order to achieve the above objects, according to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided a rendering apparatus for bitmapping object data into bitmap image data in accordance with a process list to generate rendering data, comprising: address designation means for designating a plurality of addresses to the process list; selection means for sequentially selecting one of the plurality of addresses designated by the address designation means; and rendering means for bitmapping object data into bitmap image data in accordance with the process list designated by the selected address to generate rendering data.
According to another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a printing apparatus for simultaneously outputting images to a printing medium using a plurality of image output sections, comprising: a rendering processing section for bitmapping object data into bitmap image data in accordance with a process list to generate rendering data; address designation means for designating addresses of a plurality of process lists to be processed by the rendering processing section; rendering control means for causing the rendering processing section to alternately execute rendering processing for the process lists at the plurality of addresses designated by the address designation means; and a plurality of image output sections for parallelly outputting a plurality of rendering data corresponding to the process lists obtained by the rendering control means to the printing medium.
According to still another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a printing control apparatus for outputting image data to a plurality of image output sections for simultaneously outputting images to a printing medium, comprising: a rendering processing section for bitmapping object data into bitmap image data in accordance with a process list to generate rendering data; address designation means for designating addresses of a plurality of process lists to be processed by the rendering processing section; rendering control means for causing the rendering processing section to alternately execute rendering processing for the process lists at the plurality of addresses designated by the address designation means; and output control means for outputting the plurality of rendering data corresponding to the plurality of process lists obtained by the rendering control means to a printing apparatus to make the plurality of image output sections simultaneously output the rendering data.
Other features and advantages of the present invention will be apparent from the following description taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which like reference characters designate the same or similar parts throughout the figures thereof.